Saturday, November 22, 2014

The psychopath factories

The internet is abuzz about this story by Sabrina Rubin Erdely in Rolling Stone about Jackie, a freshman who was gang-raped at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity at the University of Virginia in 2012. The university administration, and even Jackie's own friends, discouraged her from going to the police, and in the end, none of her assailants suffered any consequences.

The reason why is simple. Assaulting women is the whole point of college fraternities. These organizations exist to shape the characters of the future business leaders of America, and the way to succeed in business is to be a psychopath. Raping women teaches these future corporate executives and Wall Street traders that they are the untouchable elite, and that everyone who isn't part of their elite is a commodity to be used and discarded as they see fit.

In a follow-up story, Rolling Stone reports on UVA President Teresa A. Sullivan's announcement that the university's fraternities have been suspended until the beginning of the spring semester in January 2015. And what will happen then? In a word, nothing. The frats perform a vital function in our society, and that function requires them to train their members to be monsters. The fraternities will continue to operate as they have always done, and women like Jackie will continue to be used to teach the brothers how to become America's psychopathic business elite.

In a way, Jackie's experience was an important learning experience. It has given her a foretaste of the life she will live in a country run by her assailants.

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